Film School

 Three fifteen-year-old friends were leaving the theater in Butt Hole, CA, a small agricultural community in the Great Central Valley roughly mid-way between Fresno to the north and Bakersfield to the south. The town is not really named Butt Hole, but the three friends named it that because one of the three, Gooch, considered the dimmest of the friends, couldn't wrap his lips around that soft ph sound of word 'sphincter' which was what his friend and science-fiction reading buddy Eddie wanted to call it.

     The marquis over their head announced the week-long engagement of the classic, coming-of-age John Hughes film Sixteen Candles. The movie starred Molly Ringwald as the birthday girl and Anthony Michael Hall, in his break-out role as the geeky and cheeky, braces-wearing Ted Farmer.

   Danny, a skinny, long-haired, Mexican-American kid looked back at the marquis then back at his friends and said, "That movie ought  to get an Academy Award. If it don't, it just proves the whole damned system is rigged."

   The more studious looking, glasses wearing Eddie nodded and remarked, "Anthony Michael Hall should get the Best Actor Award too. His comedic timing is genius level. He didn't miss a lick."

    Gooch, the quietest of the three, was the pudgy brunt of all their adolescent teasing. When they looked at him, it was usually a sign for him to agree with whatever they were saying. It took him a moment to collect his thoughts because he needed to be careful as his fiends always seem to point out every flaw in his logic, "It was a good movie. The only thing I thought was weird was that they only charged a dollar for their friends to look at Molly Ringwald's underwear."

     Danny was the first to attack, "What was weird about that? You wouldn't pay a dollar to look at Molly Ringwald's underwear?"

      "I don't know, it just seems like they could have charged more, I mean it being Molly Ringwald and all."

       Eddie was next, "Gooch, you idiot. They didn't know it was Molly Ringwald in the movie. She was playing a role. Her name was Samantha in the movie."

         "I'm confused. It wasn't Molly Ringwald?"

        Danny was weirdly exasperated at Gooch's ignorance, "Damn it Gooch, It was Molly! But it's like she was an ordinary person and not a celebrity."

          "An ordinary person? You mean like somebody paying a dollar to see Eddie's underwear?"

      They were walking down Main Street and were already a block away. and Danny and Eddie stopped just so they could shake their heads at Gooch's naivety. Then Danny added, "Gooch, no one in their right mind is going pay a dollar to see Eddie's underwear. That's not even the point  they were trying to make."

      Eddie quickly objected, "Now, I wouldn't go that far. I'm sure there would be somebody at our school who would fork out a dollar or two to examine my underwear."

     This caused Danny to come to another abrupt stop, "Please, Eddy if you know the identity of anyone of our classmates who would trade a dollar bill for the opportunity to see the skid-marks in your drawers, I would greatly appreciate you keeping that information to your self. Don't even tell Gooch because he'd let it leak out by accident."

      Eddie was more than a little annoyed by his friend chastising him especially because he did it in front of Gooch. "Just saying. You said it like I had a disease or something, like I was the most unattractive boy in our grade level whereas everybody knows that would be Harold Lesley. You implied that my underwear was worse than Harold Lesley's acne."

        "I did no such thing. I just plucked your name out of the thin  air, cause you were right there and Gooch asked such a stupid question."

       Now, it wasn't so much that Eddie was satisfied with the answer as much as he saw a way to beat a hasty retreat by shifting things in the direction of Gooch. "Yeah, Gooch; you shouldn't ask such stupid questions." 

      The friends walked along silently for a while. Gooch pulled his head down between his shoulders like a turtle and looked down at the sidewalk being careful not to step on the cracks. Danny seemed to be mulling the whole thing over in his head, and Eddie was thinking of something to say that would take the focus off of the desirability or lack thereof of his underwear.

    It was Eddie who broke the silence. "How about that party though? That shit was out of control!"

    Danny jumped on it immediately, "Wasn't that something! How cool would that be to go to a party like with all that beer, and pretty rich girls crawling all over the place!"

    When Gooch didn't volunteer his agreement, the other two turned on him to coax him back into orbit.

    Eddie asked, 'Whadda you think, Gooch? Don't you wish you could go to party like that?"

     The Danny questioned, "Yeah, Gooch! Would that be the coolest thing ever? They even had a whole keg of beer."

      "I was thinking if I could go to party like that, I would take a five-gallon gas can."

       Danny and Eddie chimed together in disbelief, "A GAS CAN!"

     "Yeah. Like the one my dad has in our garage at home."

     Danny was astounded, "Your dad keeps gas for his lawn-mower in that can, Gooch. You gonna put beer in a can your dad keeps gas in? I hope you empty it out first. At Least!"

       "Not that one, I would bring a new one."

     Eddy laughed loudly and high-fived Danny, "Gooch, what the hell you thinking? What kind of knuckle-head would take a five gallon gas can to a keg party?"

       They quit laughing just long enough for Gooch answer, thinking they could quickly pounce on his response with another good joke.

        "I meant so I could fill it up with beer, then bring it back here, so we could drink it together."

        And for a moment, on an uneven sidewalk, right next to the wide paved, pot-hole plagued main street in a dusty little town often referred to as the sphincter muscle of California by some of its more jaded, younger denizens, you could have heard a fucking pin drop.